I wasn't as wild about Contagion as some. I loved Damon, who brings a wonderful lustrelessness to his Home Depot Dad, and Jennifer Ehle who plays one of the few believable scientists I have seen onscreen — a superb mixture of blitheness and feral concentration. The film is smart and forensically researched but a few more cheap thrills wouldn't have hurt. (Missing scenes: the story goes national, the first person to survive, and: a follow-up with Gwyneth's Chicago lover.) It feel skimpy, rather than elliptically modernist. I wanted another $10 million spent on it. B-
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The film assumes an anti-Emmerich stance, as if it's above cheap thrills, and yet the final "revelation" is as cheap a thrill as they get.
ReplyDeleteSoderbergh withholds. The Dude abides. I'll go with the Dude.
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